The chess puzzle that led to the Fields Medal

What is the Fields Medal?

In other fields such as literature, economics and physics, the pinnacle of recognition is considered the Nobel Prize. No one discusses the sheer prestige it brings without bickering about the politicization of some choices and the inability to give deserving candidates enough prizes. there is no.

In mathematics, there are two major awards for that specialty. One is the Abel Prize, a new award modeled on the Nobel Prize that started in 2003. As with its well-known peers, it rewards not only groundbreaking work, but also careers and contributions in the field. Still, the best and most famous of all mathematics awards is the Fields Medal.

First awarded in 1936, the Fields Medal was devised by Canadian mathematician John Charles Fields. Among the highest academic honors for being under 40 years old as of January 1, early in his career, and honoring not only his past achievements but also the promise of future breakthroughs remains rare in

Its influence has also been referenced in popular culture, with key points for Gerald Rambeau’s character in Matt Damon and the Affleck brothers’ breakthrough film Good Will Hunting, and Robin Williams for Best Supporting Role. Won an award for Best Actor.

Dr. June Hu and Chess Puzzles

As Dr. June Hu, now 39, explains, his first insight into combinatorial mathematics came from a video game called The 11th Hour. In this His 1995 Horror His Adventure Movie game, you have to solve the following puzzles:

goal: Swap the positions of the black and white knights

This puzzle took the young player a week to solve, but he solved it. This doesn’t mean he sent in a solution just to be awarded the Fields Medal 27 years later.

Dr. Huh’s field is known as combinatorics. This is the branch of mathematics that calculates the number of ways things can be shuffled. The interesting part is how to apply it to the above problem. We need a broader system or solution that can be applied to a class of similar problems.

The key to finding the mathematical solution is to first decompose it in a simpler way. Dr. Huh explains that he noticed that the oddly shaped board and the knight’s L-shaped movements were unrelated.

This particular set of problems, known as color polynomials, is where I came to understand better with the breakthrough mathematical formula that solves them.

From zero to hero

Part of Dr. Huh’s appeal is not just his ability to translate the above puzzle into a broader mathematical equation, but how he got there. This was not the case of a budding genius from early on who astonished less talented colleagues with his insight, nor perhaps of a brilliant introvert who had hitherto been misunderstood. As he explained to The New York Times:

“I was good at most subjects except math,” he said. “Mathematics was particularly mediocre on average, and I was pretty OK on some tests. But on others I mostly failed.”

As a teenager, Dr. Fu wanted to be a poet. He pursued that creative pursuit for several years after high school. However, none of his writings were published.

This doesn’t sound like a path to a PhD in mathematics, and never mind future Fields Medal winners, but that all changed in my last year of college at age 23. He himself won his Fields Medal in 1970, and what began as a plan to write an article about the professor became a temptation and lure into the field of mathematics itself. After graduating from Dr. Hironaka as his supervisor, he applied for his Ph.D.

“Despite all the mathematics course failures on my undergraduate transcript, I received an enthusiastic letter from a Fields Medal winner, so I was fairly confident that it would be accepted by many graduate schools.”

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign put him on a waiting list before finally accepting him.

“It’s been a very disturbing few weeks,” Dr. Huh said.

At the University of Illinois, he began work that distinguished him in the field of combinatorics.

This story simply shows what talent and passion can achieve, regardless of early signs or false starts, and should serve as an example for all.

Read the full New York Times article

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